Read Leaping for Free Online Page B

Look at the way
he'd been treating Cori. His sister. Everyone.
    The
victory was in not giving up on who he was and what he was called to do…and
what he believed. And who he believed in.
    The F word. Forgiveness. Always the ultimate victory cause it took God, the real God, not the version of
him he created or shunned so he could control him, but the real God of
Scripture, the Forgiver, it took Him to even make forgiveness a consideration….
    "Oh
shit," he whispered. He was having his revelation, finally. He was moving
in the womb of his seclusion, his head aligning with the birth canal and he'd
had no more to do with this birth than the others, the one where he'd come
screaming forth from his mother, the one he'd found that night in college,
kneeling at his window grieving her.
    The
call was always the victory. He had to forgive.
    He
eased from her, but not before kissing her forehead.
    He
looked down on her as he stood beside the couch now. She was still asleep, her
face, he saw it then, etched in the beauty, the slight trace of suffering. He
felt it then, in a new way, her honest and bold need of him, he faced her
generosity, the way she'd given…from the first, the widow's mite, the gift of all she had…he saw it then, he felt it.
    Oh,
the crash of discovery. Too much was coming at once now. He had to tear himself
away from her. He wasn't worthy yet. There had to be something backing any promise
he would make, any conclusion he might make regarding one so beautifully frail…so
angelic.
    He
crept from the room, from the house, into the cold night, and the rowdy
movement of the Leviathan that roiled the ocean. He got to the water and he
walked in until it was to his waist, and he plunged under and quickly stood,
gasping and flipping his hair back.
    He
would leave it here in the ocean…James…in God's hands now…beyond them all. He
would let the sea take the infection from him, and he steadied his feet in the
dwindling sand and eyes to the sky and just quiet and small and cleansed.
    He
said two things when he finally spoke, two words that typified every prayer
that didn't ask for help. He thought of the revelation, and he thought of her,
the embodiment of God's offer, his second chance…to live. "Thank you."
    And
in response a hand, gripping his as it ruddered through the water. She stood beside him in the cold, the shocking cold, of course she'd come right
in. He looked at her…and he wondered before…was she real?
    She
smiled at him, then a wave hit them hard and she laughed, and he did, and he
scooped her up and trudged awkwardly onto the beach, and he kept going, toward
the house, but he couldn't stop looking at her. He wouldn't.
    "You're
different," she said softly, her arms around his neck.
    He
smiled at her. And they reached the porch stairs and he hurried up and into the
house and he took her all the way in and he hefted her higher in his arms and
she laughed, and he took the stairs then, the sand on the soles of his feet
scratching at the wood, and down the hall to his room, and once in there he
took her to the bed and set her there and he went to his drawers for warm
clothes and found these and gave them to her. "I'm turning the shower on,"
he said. "For you."
    "What about
you?" she said, always focused on him.
    "I'm
fine," he said. She took the clothes and looking at him, she waved a
little before closing the door.
    The
animal side of him wanted to go after her, take her there, grind into her.
    He
found more clothes and went down the hall. He got in the hot shower and quickly
washed. In five minutes he was dressed and back in his room just as she was
coming out of his bathroom. Steam followed her, and her hair was long and wet
and she smiled.
    He
put one knee on the bed and said, "Come here."
    And
she did. He settled them under the blanket and he had his arms around her.
    "Are
you okay?" she said softly, stroking his arm.
    He
nodded then, and he resituated them, and entangled with her that way, he